


everybody wants you (but I don't like a gold rush)

by queenofmarigolds



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Friends to Lovers, Game Night, Idiots in Love, Jealous Kara Danvers, LITERALLY, Lena Luthor Knows Kara Danvers Is Supergirl, Pining, SuperCorp, guardiancorp but they break up don't worry, once again explaining that this is not a lena/james fic, their relationship is a plot device for me, we are totally platonic friends! they say as they sleep in the same bed repeatedly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 03:35:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29895012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofmarigolds/pseuds/queenofmarigolds
Summary: Kara starts to feel jealous when she thinks about Lena and James dating, so naturally she assumes she’s jealous… because she’s still in love with James? Right?Or, nine times Kara’s jealous while pining for Lena (and the one time it’s all resolved)
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 26
Kudos: 452





	everybody wants you (but I don't like a gold rush)

**Author's Note:**

> another taylor swift title (this is from gold rush, in case you didn't know) and i don't even feel remotely bad about it. 
> 
> also quick warning... do not expect any coherency with canon here. I'm using season 2/3 relationships (lena and james, for part of it), the season 2 thing that Lena is the CatCo boss (Andrea is just her ex lol), season 4/5 characters (nia, kelly, brainy), and random aspects of whatever I want. Because I figure that if the writers of the actual SHOW don't need canon neither do i, right?

The Start (Or, Numbers One and Two)

Kara knows how to draw conclusions based on the facts. It is her specialty, she reasons, because she does work as a reporter, after all. And here were the facts:

1\. Lena Luthor was dating James Olsen.  
2\. At the CatCo holiday party, Lena had danced with James and Kara had felt envy brew loud in her stomach.  
3\. Whenever Lena and James would sit near each other at game night Kara gets the fierce urge to break them apart.

Which leads her to the conclusion that she, Kara Danvers, is jealous of Lena Luthor. She is jealous that Lena is dating someone she used to love, someone she thought she’d gotten over but apparently hadn’t yet. This makes her a terrible person, she’s pretty sure. Because Lena is her best friend. Lena doesn’t deserve this.

Ultimately Kara decides to make a list. Lists are good, lists make everything make sense. And of course the notebook she has handy is the gorgeous green leather one Lena had given her as a Secret Santa gift. She’d looked so nervous and fidgety as Kara had opened the gift, notebook falling into her lap with an ornate fountain pen and a little potsticker shaped sticker. She had still looked apprehensive even as Kara gushed over it. In fact, she didn’t look content until she was the last one in Kara’s apartment, crunching on the crumbs from the potato chip bag and Kara slowly traced her name into the notebook’s dark cover with her inky script. Then, Lena had beamed that close mouthed appreciative look Kara so adored. 

So she grabs the pen and notebook again, flips to an empty page in the middle, and titles it. 

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of Lena And James_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch_

Her lunch break is ending, so she places the notebook delicately into her bag and stuffs her extra papers beside it, tucks the pen into her hand, and hurries back toward her desk.

-  
Number Three

On Tuesdays Lena works from her CatCo office and Kara always eats lunch with her from her office. It makes her feel special, secretly, because no one is allowed to disturb Lena during her Tuesday lunch hour except for her. One unsatisfied coworker of Kara’s had tried once and Lena hadn’t said a word but her icy glare was enough. Nobody tries anymore, though, and so Kara gets Lena all to herself. 

It’s during one of those lunch hours that she gets to add the third occasion to her list. She and Lena are splitting a large order of chicken tacos and Lena keeps brushing by Kara to reach for her drink and it’s making her stomach feel sort of strange. 

“The tacos are excellent,” Lena offers kindly, tilting her happy gaze toward Kara. 

“Kelly and I have started comparing food spots,” she explains unnecessarily, “because Alex is always telling me about the great spots they go to on their dates? And, well, you know how I am about my restaurants.” She feels a little silly for telling Lena this when she hasn’t really asked, or anything, but Lena just smiles kindly. 

“That does sound like a good idea for you. Keep your options open, right?”

This is why Lena is her best friend, Kara thinks as she nods appreciatively. She always knows what to say, never makes Kara feel odd for sharing the insignificant details. It’s just something about Lena that makes Kara want to tell her everything she can. Some code of best friends that she’d missed out on thus far. 

“So I have to tell you,” Lena says excitedly around a bite of taco, “I’m taking your advice and I’m gonna redecorate my place. I think I’ll start with the living room, make it less sterile.”

Kara makes an excited noise through a mouthful of chicken. “Lena!” she exclaims when she’s swallowed, “Yes, this is great! I’m already so excited to see how it looks when it’s done.”

“Well, I was actually wondering if you would maybe help me pick some stuff out,” Lena says, “I just… your house always looks so cozy, I was thinking we could look at a few furniture stores this weekend. Only if you want to, of course, but it could be a project?”

“Oh, that’s perfect! I have, like, a billion ideas already,” Kara says, feeling herself almost vibrate with excitement. Because she loves decorating, that’s all. Obviously. 

“Good,” Lena replies softly, looking at Kara over her plate with a sort of happy and soft look in her eye that makes Kara want to pull her into a hug for a long time. It’s warm and so she smiles wide, brightly, leans over to steal a piece of Lena’s chicken. 

Spending time with Lena is so effortless, she marvels. She’s glad she has a best friend like that.

Of course, that’s when it all goes wrong. Lena’s phone dings loudly and she swallows, wipes her right hand on her napkin and picks it up from its spot on the edge of the table. Her eyes skim over the screen and Kara can’t help watching. It’s weirdly mesmerizing, she doesn’t know why but she can see Lena’s lips purse and it’s strange, intense. 

She realizes then that Lena’s lips have twisted into a smile, that there’s a light pink blush dusting the tops of her cheeks. Kara’s brow furrows as Lena wipes her left hand and lets her fingers tap rapidly over her screen, smiling faintly all the while. 

“It’s James,” Lena says, but she doesn’t look up from her phone. “He’s just checking in with me about the morning, give me one second, Kara. Sorry.”

“Yeah, sure,” Kara says quietly but it sounds like it’s coming from underwater, for some reason. Lena is still watching her phone and she looks so happy. Which is great! But it reminds Kara of something, something she can’t quite place. The memory stirs something in her stomach.

Lena’s fingers continue to tap away for two or three seconds before she shuts off the phone, placing it back down on the table with a light tap and refocusing her attention on Kara. “So, what do you think I could do with the living room? And that damn bar next to the kitchen.”

Kara’s hardly paying attention, though. She’s located the strange feeling, now fixated on the cruel feeling of jealousy curling in her chest. Which is odd, because when she’d broken things off with James over a year ago she’d been… fine. It had been right. 

Why should she be jealous?

The rest of their lunch is almost a blur to Kara. She makes vague plans with Lena to hit some of the better furniture stores in the city on Saturday and finishes off Lena’s food when it’s held out to her questioningly. She goes through the motions (the smiles come naturally, though, with Lena they tend to) but there’s still that odd pit in her chest.

She hadn’t really realized she’d still liked James quite so much. Or at all, really. In fact, she’d been pretty sure she’d completely moved on, but the feelings whirling around in her head were unmistakable, and who else could she be feeling so strongly about? James was the only person she’d felt that way for in a while. 

It made sense, she supposes. James texted Lena and Lena had blushed and… Kara had wished she’d been the one getting that text? She wished she had been Lena?

No, it had absolutely been odd.

And even if she had feelings for James, wouldn’t they be little ones? What she’d felt had been all heavy titles and bold proclamations. Not light crush stuff, she’s pretty sure. 

What is happening to her?

Kara sighs as she heads back to her desk, squashing the jealousy in its path. It isn’t fair. Lena is her _best friend_ , she doesn’t deserve someone who will brood over missed opportunities with Lena’s own boyfriend all through their time together. She needs to get it together. 

She’s got a new article to write and two interviews to set up but as she sits back down she doesn’t reach for her computer first. Instead she opens her bag, takes out the green leather notebook and fancy pen and bites her lip before writing. 

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of Lena And James_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing_

Kara fidgets, squints down at the page. The ink is drying and she feels almost guilty, angry at herself for thinking about her friends in this way. For feeling envy about her _best friend_...

She sighs again, blows soft air over the third bullet, and shuts the notebook with a click. 

-  
Number Four

It’s cold out, the tail end of winter. Alex, Kelly, James, Lena all agreed to a dinner before the weekend, which is only mildly uncomfortable because Kara’s the only single one there. But she’s used to it! And the place they’re eating at is amazing, and they serve the best burgers on the west side of National City! So really, Kara isn’t at all concerned. Not even a little bit.

Lena’s waiting outside the restaurant. James is there too, holding Lena’s hand under the strange fierce glow of the orange restaurant lamps. Lena’s bundled in a scarf and a hat, a hat with an actual pom-pom on it and it’s _so_ sweet that Kara would tease her, but then there’s, like, a five percent chance Lena would take it off and she couldn’t have that. That would be a tragedy. Instead she walks up to Lena and James slowly.

“Hey, Kara,” James greets her when she’s a few feet away and Lena looks up quickly. 

“Hi!” Kara says, “Are we still waiting on Alex and Kelly?”

“Oh, no. We were waiting on you, actually,” James says, glancing at Lena with an odd expression on his face that Kara can’t quite decipher, “Lena insisted we wait out here, make sure you got here alright.”

“Oh,” Kara says, glancing in Lena’s direction. As she does, though, Lena glances up at the menu posted on the restaurant window, peering intently at the salads section. “Well, sorry to have kept you waiting. I got kinda held up at CatCo, I’m working on this new feature about the aliens of NCU?”

James nods and then Lena looks back at her under the lights and her heart feels like it’s beating a little steadier. Maybe it’s from the promise of food in her near future.

So James nods but it’s Lena who smiles, asks her about what she’s been writing so far, prompts her to continue. They walk inside, James lingering a little bit away from the pair, and all three of them meet Alex and Kelly at a table near the back. 

The restaurant is crowded, Kara’s explanation of her article is getting a little muffled and Lena’s brow is furrowed in that way that means she’s actually curious. Kara leans in a little closer to her, trying her best to talk without getting too close. Lena’s still nodding intently.  
“So do you profile in any categorized way—thanks, Kelly,” Lena says, squeezing past Kelly to slip into a seat, gesturing for Kara to sit beside her, “or is it just randomized? Or chronological, I suppose?”

Kara slides around James’s seat at the end of the table to sit between him and Lena. She looks between them, about to offer to switch if they want to sit next to each other, but Lena just looks at her expectantly so she sits down and starts to walk Lena through the complicated system Nia had suggested involving home planet, college major, and last name. 

James strikes up a conversation with Alex about something boring, Kara assumes, because she tries to tune in for approximately two minutes before she loses all trains of thought abruptly. Probably about the mayor. Or maybe something business related? Either way, Kelly joins in as soon as the waitress drops a basket of bread at the table and no one seems to notice, so Kara takes a piece. And then a second. Then a third. 

Well, no one notices except for Lena. Lena’s grinning at her, raising her eyebrows at Kara’s stack of bread rolls. “Do you think that’ll be enough, Kara?”

Kara blushes slightly. “Lena! You know I have to keep myself energized!”

“Am I allowed to have a roll?” Alex says, raising a brow at Kara (but it’s different than when Lena does it, somehow. Weird). Kara wrinkles her nose at her sister and as Alex makes a face back she slides the basket across the table. She turns back to Lena.

“See?” She says petulantly, “I’m totally sharing.”

“Totally,” Lena says softly. Then, to show that she’s just teasing Kara, she glides her fingers up Kara’s hand and to her wrist, which she grasps lightly as she sends a final smile in Kara’s direction before joining the mind-numbing conversation next to them.

She doesn’t take her hand away for a long moment.

Kara isn’t really listening but she hears Lena laugh at something James says, sees James lean a little across Kara to be closer to his girlfriend. It’s a lot.

The table is small and kind of cramped, so when James’s phone rings a few minutes later he has to slide his chair all the way in Kara’s direction to take the call on the restaurant patio. “Sorry,” he says with an apologetic grimace, “I’ll just be a minute.”

He’s gone for five when the waitress comes by to take their orders and Kara doesn’t want to be rude but she’s _starving_. However, Alex seems to have the same idea. 

“Yeah, I’ll have the chicken parmesan with a side salad,” her sister requests as she passes her menu down the table. Kelly glances to the patio, but James is still engaged with his call. She sighs, then places her order.

“Hi,” Kara says, “I’ll have the Double Whammy Cheeseburger, please? With a side of fries. And would it be possible to also get the baked potato side with that? Also I’ll take an order of the mac and cheese, please.”

She turns to Lena expectantly, handing her menu toward the end of the table. Lena is biting her lip to stifle a grin.

“I’ll have a chicken caesar salad, please,” she says, and Kara cringes. “Um, and he’ll take the braised pork with a side of your soup of the day.” She lays her hand over James’s place setting and the waitress nods, writes down the last of the orders and exits. 

Kara can’t help feeling a little alarmed. “How did you know what he’d want?” She asks Lena privately, in the close up way she always does when a question is for Lena and Lena alone. (Sometimes that’s the case, Kara’s learned, sometimes she needs Lena’s soft answer and kind eyes. Lena always respects it, too, always respects _her_.)

“We’ve ordered from here before, that’s his usual,” Lena says, watching Kara closely with her eyes glinting in the dim light, “Kara? Are you alright?”

She had been, but she isn’t anymore. That dreadfully new familiar feeling is back, the one that feels like her chest and stomach have melted together and bled out of her in a strange gash of jealousy. They know each other’s orders? They’ve eaten out together enough that Lena knows exactly what James would want?

“I’m okay,” she says in answer to Lena’s furrowed brow. She doesn’t seem completely satisfied but she does nod and turn back to Alex and Kelly, because that’s the rule. If you say you’re okay you’re okay, because friends don’t push.

James comes back and shoots Lena a private smile and a little look that is clearly _only for her_ and Kara sinks a little further back into her chair. “I ordered for you,” she can hear Lena saying, but it feels faint. Kara is thinking.

Maybe her strange twisted jealousy-ridden mind was upset that _she_ didn’t know James’s order. That would make sense, right? Kara loves food, she’s heard Alex say it’s like her love language. So if she loved James…? Which she doesn’t. Right?

Okay. Lena knew James’s order because Lena and James spent so much time together, apparently. They went to get food without her (of course they did, she reminds herself after angrily biting into her third roll, they’re _dating_. Obviously they did things together. Obviously). They had a whole life where Lena knew what James ordered and Kara didn’t. 

Maybe Lena was just good at that, Kara reasoned. She took another bite of bread in contemplation. Lena did know her order at about five takeout places, after all.

Still. 

Something felt so wrong in her stomach and even her massive cheeseburger couldn’t fix it (it helped, though. It definitely helped). She tries to have a good time anyway and succeeds, a little bit. She orders a sundae and lets Lena and Kelly split the brownie on top. Lena drives her and James home in her town car (another small twinge of jealousy there, because they drop Kara off and then drive away _together_ ). 

It’s a good night, it’s a nice night. Lena had blown her a kiss out the car window, her face a pale glow in the streetlamps. James had sent her a big smile and a quick wave. Her neighbor’s cat was patrolling the hallway as it sometimes did, so Kara took a detour to pet the adorable thing for a moment before unlocking her door and flopping onto the couch.

Her phone buzzes with a text. _Home safe,_ it reads, _it was nice to see you tonight. Lunch on Tuesday?_ It’s from Lena, of course, and so Kara answers immediately that she’d love to and that she has a burrito place in mind. Lena sends back a little red heart. It’s all _good_.

She can’t quite shake that lingering feeling, though, so she opens her desk drawer and takes out her green notebook, flips to the page.

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of Lena And James_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him_

The list still makes her feel a little guilty, almost like there’s something wrong with it other than the fact that she’s best friends with the people it’s about. There is absolutely something strange about her supposed feelings for James, something that doesn’t quite land in her chest.

But she’s tired and she’s full of burger and ice cream and mac and cheese and baked potato. Khe speeds through her nighttime routine and is in bed before the neon numbers on her hot pink alarm clock click up to eleven.

-  
Number Five

Fridays are for sleepovers. It’s happened a grand total of five times, if Kara’s counting tonight. Every time she feels a deep sense of rightness, like everything is as it’s supposed to be. When she looks around and sees glittering street lights out her window with a pint of mint chip ice cream on the counter and Lena cuddled in a big blanket on her couch it’s pretty hard not to feel completely content. 

Tonight they are watching _The Parent Trap_ with a big bowl of experimental popcorn, which in this case means that Kara had poured parmesan cheese and garlic powder over it solely because it had made Lena giggle. But, she marvels as she pops another handful into her mouth, she’d done a pretty excellent job. Maybe in another life she could have been a chef. Or someone who opens a test kitchen. She could’ve lived in New York City, and Lena would stop by her store in the evenings while Alex and Kelly had dinners outside.

Anyway. Her popcorn is good.

Lena seems to think so too. She keeps leaning over Kara’s lap to reach for the bowl situated between her legs, nuzzling close to Kara’s shoulder each time. Privately, Kara isn't quite sure why she doesn't just move the bowl between them. But she is not going to complain because Lena is actually _enjoying_ the movie and is here, with her, on her couch. And Kara is content.

When the twins put Meredith’s bed out on the water Kara finds herself snorting loudly. Lena rolls her head back until she’s gazing at Kara at a crooked angle. She raises an eyebrow. 

“Why can I picture a young Kara and Alex doing something just like that?

Kara snorts again.”Because it’s absolutely something Alex would’ve come up with. I would’ve never done it, though, I was a perfect angel.”

Lena chuckles disbelievingly. “Yeah, right. What was the worst thing you ever did as a kid?”

“You answer that,” Kara says, tossing a handful of popcorn into her mouth, “it’ll be more interesting, for sure.”

Lena purses her lips. “Aside from the tattoos, I’m assuming?”

Kara practically chokes, inhaling a mouthful of popcorn and garlic powder. She’s still heaving as Lena hands her a glass of water, concern etching into her forehead. She takes a big gulp. _Lena has a tattoo? Multiple tattoos?_ The only thing she can think to wonder is _where_ , which feels inappropriate for some reason. So she squeezes her eyes shut and swallows, breathing slowly. 

“Are you okay?” Lena asks, and there’s a faint smile twisting her features. Kara nods, blushing slightly. “I’m fine. I, um… I didn’t know you had tattoos.”

She isn’t sure why she says that but it seems vital at the moment and Lena just looks over at her. “I do,” she says, “I have five.”

“Five,” Kara replies faintly.

“Yeah. Shoulder, ankle, back, wrist,” she demonstrates, shaking up her long sleeve so Kara can see a little line drawing of a sprig she’s somehow never noticed (how has she never noticed?), “and, well…” Lena trails off with a smirk. Kara turns bright red again.

“A-um, and?”

Lena raises an eyebrow. Kara gulps, feeling very warm all of a sudden.

Lena pins her with her molten gaze for a few more seconds before she glances away, squints back at the TV for a moment. “Well, the worst thing I ever did… when I was in boarding school my roommate and I would sneak off the grounds basically every other night. Obviously everyone knew but it wasn’t like they could do anything, my mother and her father were donating obscene amounts of money to the school board.”

“What would you do?” Kara asks gently and Lena glances at her with an odd expression, as though she wasn’t expecting Kara to say anything. She nods slowly. 

“Well, sometimes we’d sneak into the bar, you know. But most of the time we’d go to the beach, there was this gorgeous little lookout point. The water was freezing, we wouldn’t go in, but we’d play music, get food, sometimes drinks. She looked older than she was, you know,” Lena says. She’s still watching the TV but she looks almost faraway. “We’d smoke in the park with these older guys sometimes. Andrea knew exactly how much to flirt, like… just enough so that they’d let us use their stuff but not quite so much that they’d think they actually had a chance with us. We didn’t actually have a car but we made friends with people at our brother school. That’s how I met Jack, actually,” she says, finally turning to Kara, “and he had a convertible. So we’d speed and play music really loud. Andrea had terrible taste. A lot of OutKast, for some reason,” she laughs. 

Kara smiles. “Honestly? That doesn’t sound bad. That sounds lovely.”

Lena considers her again. “Yeah. It was. I guess I just have bad memories, you know. First time I ever had my heart broken.”

Kara furrows her brow. “I thought you and Jack didn’t go out until you were in Metropolis?”

“Not Jack,” Lena says, grabbing some popcorn nonchalantly, “Andrea, I mean.”

Kara’s world tilts on its axis for the second time that night.

“You’re… I didn’t know you… I mean, you like—,”

“Women?” Lena adds, raising her eyebrows at Kara. “I mean, yeah. I’m bisexual, Kara. I kind of assumed you would’ve… well, assumed.”

“I didn’t,” Kara says. She’s feeling sort of breathless, for some reason. Maybe she should slow down on the popcorn, that was probably it. “I mean, of course I don’t have a problem with it! I mean, I… gender doesn’t matter to me, I’ve… well, I’ve dated women before. And, you know. Slept with women. Which is great. Awesome, actually.” She cringes, presses her lips together.

Lena just smiles at her though. “Not to be abrupt, Kara, but I did think that was sort of evident.”

“Is it?”

Lena shrugs. “To me it was,” she says airily, then turns back to the TV.

Kara considers this very thoroughly until the twins finally get their parents to the hotel and then she lets her mind wander back to the screen.

-

When the movie finishes Kara notices Lena’s eyes are drooping subtly. In a burst of superspeed she tidies up the popcorn and turns off the TV, stopping in her bedroom to grab Lena a t-shirt and sweatpants. She’s back in front of Lena in a burst and Lena smiles lazily up at her, reaching out for the clothes.

“Thanks, Kara,” she says, “I’ll meet you back in a minute.”

As Lena gets ready in the bathroom Kara cleans up her bedroom in a bit of a panic. It’s just Lena, she knows, and Lena wouldn’t judge her for how her house looks. But still, Lena sleeps in a fancy bed with perfect sheets and the softest of blankets possible. It’s the least she can do to make her comforter look presentable, to clean up the pile of clothes growing in the corner next to her wooden divider. 

She stands back, peering at the bed before leaning forward again to smooth out a wrinkle. Lena peeks her head into the room at that moment. 

“You ready?” she asks quietly.

The first time Lena had stayed over she’d been very apprehensive about sleeping in the bed. At first she’d insisted upon staying on the couch, which Kara obviously would not tolerate. “You’re my guest, Lena, you have to take the bed,” she’d begged her. Lena had finally agreed, but had looked absolutely shocked when Kara grabbed a blanket from her armchair and had wished Lena goodnight as she’d wandered toward the couch herself. 

“What do you think you’re doing, Kara?” She’d asked. 

“Um. Going to sleep?”

“On the couch?”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Get in.”

And she had known Lena had been just as nervous as her but then suddenly it was morning and she felt warmer than she ever had with Lena’s head tucked into her chest. Lena had blinked up at her and the sun was falling at such a lovely angle onto Kara’s face and it had been one of the best mornings of her life. So ever since then there had been no question of where they would sleep at their sleepovers. Why mess with a perfect system?

Now Kara nods. “Yeah, just gonna get some water. Do you want some?”

“That’d be great,” Lena says, giving a private smile, the kind she really only directed at Kara. 

So Kara sets off for the kitchen, grabbing two cups and some ice. Her eyes landed on a photo stuck to her fridge with a magnet, one of her and Lena at their favorite diner. It was taken after Kara had broken the record for eating the most pancakes in the history of the establishment, according to the owner, and it made her smile even now in the cool quiet of night. She and Lena were both beaming at the camera, Kara holding her empty plate up triumphantly while Lena’s hand rested on her shoulder. 

She collects the water glasses, decides that she is going to ask Lena if she wants to go to the diner for breakfast in the morning. She walks back into her room daydreaming about french toast with bananas and blueberries and whipped cream when she comes to a halt at the edge of the room divider. 

Lena is already in bed, curled up in Kara’s patterned comforter with her head resting against the wall. She’s gazing at her phone, hair pulled up in a sloppy bun and arms tucked half under the blanket. She looks up as Kara steps into the room further, smiles, and turns back to her phone.

Kara feels stuck. She’s hit with the horrible realization that Lena and James have been dating for a little while now, that they’ve probably been _together_. Like, in bed. And that when James comes into his room when Lena is over he sees this exact sight, sees her tucked in amongst his blankets. 

She’s filled with that now sickly familiar feeling again, the bowling ball in her stomach. She can hardly understand it. She never used to feel this way about James, it’s only been since he’s been dating again. And this…

James having a girl in his bed, having _Lena_ in his bed… she isn’t sure why it leaves such a bad taste in her mouth. It’s dramatic, all of a sudden, and she feels nauseated. Lena tucks a fallen piece of hair out of her face, fidgets with the edge of her phone case. Her feet move softly under the blankets. Kara feels her stomach turn unpleasantly. 

Lena looks up at her then, so softly that Kara feels guilt and something else rush through her in a wave; she can’t believe she’s gotten _Lena_ involved with this, perfect Lena who deserves none of her jealousy projected onto her. 

“Are you okay, Kara?”

Her feet feel like they can move again and so she tells them to, stumbles over to Lena to hand her the glass of water. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

Lena furrows her brow but nods, flips the corner of the blanket over to allow Kara to join her in bed. And she does, flips the lightswitch so the room is bathed in deep blues and faint grays. Lena hums, curls into her side. She’s warm and soft and Kara turns her head, breathes out a sigh against Lena’s hair. 

In the morning before they leave for the diner, while Lena is showering, Kara adds to her list.

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of Lena And James_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him  
#5: When it hit me that they sleep together & spend the night & I’m not there (??? It sounds weird Kara!!)_

She gazes at her added bullet point and sighs. She doesn’t know how to phrase it, finds it hard to put the twisty feelings in her stomach into words. The water in the bathroom shuts off and Kara clicks the notebook shut, grabs a white t-shirt from her dresser, and starts to change.

-  
Number Six

Alex hosts the next game night. Kelly helps her, making several texts on the group chain to tell everyone what to bring. Kara is in charge of Clue (“Not Clue Jr., Kara,” Alex had said forcefully even though Kara had explained _many_ times why it was more fun) and crunchy things. “No Cheetos, though, because the rug is white,” Kelly had specified.

So Kara was at the door to Alex’s place ten minutes early with two tubes of Pringles and a bag of kale chips that Lena and Kelly inexplicably adored and a grown-up version of Clue. 

Kelly lets her in hastily. “Put the food in a bowl— oh, you got the chips! Kara, you are a godsend. Lena, look what Kara brought us!”

Lena’s there too, Kara notes in a sort of delayed reaction. She’s coming over to observe the awful vegetable chips Kelly is clutching. 

“Didn’t they burn you, Kara?” Lena asks her with a smirk. Kara’s stomach turns happily.

“Hi, Lena.”

“Hi. Do you want me to take the game? Here, we’re making a stack.”

She leads Kara over to the table where Alex is diligently setting up some complicated game.

“Oh good, you’re here. Winn says he’ll be here in a few, he’s coming with Nia and J’onn and Brainy. James can’t make it, he’s on an assignment about photographs in marketing or markets or something. Could you put the chips in a bowl before you eat them all, Kara? 

Kara looks up from the Pringles can. “They’re good,” she says indignantly, “I got the cheddar ones!”

“Yeah, and I’d like some too!”

“Wow, you’re mean,” Kara says and Alex pokes her in the leg. “Ow!”

“You’re _Supergirl_ , Kara. Please.”

“It’s an emotional pain. The pain of betrayal.”

“Shut up.”

“No, now I know that you wouldn’t have my back in battle. That’s cold, Alex. Your own _sister_?”

“Lena, come collect her, please. Save us all.”

-

Kara wins at Clue. “It’s always Mr. Green,” she says sagely, popping a Pringle into her mouth, “he’s suspicious. His story never checks out, you know?”

“He is kind of a creep,” Alex says, studying his face on the box intently, “what’s with the bald spot? Who is this guy?”

“I think he’s, like, a con man,” Kelly says, “I feel like I read that somewhere.”

“Scarlet is objectively scarier,” Winn says.

“No, she’s pretty!”

“It doesn’t make sense, anyway,” Kara says, grabbing another handful of chips. “Like, why are they all there? How do they know each other? Are you telling me Colonel Mustard is friends with Ms. Peacock? No, it’s all a lie. They all probably killed the dude together.”

“The only relationship that makes sense is Scarlet and Peacock,” Lena adds, glancing at the board, “I mean, there’s clearly something there, right?”

“Yes,” Winn says, pointing at the box, “yes, you’re right.”

“I always liked Plum,” Nia adds. Kara wrinkles her nose.

“Why?”

“He’s cute! He’s got, like, a rugged look.”

“Does he?”

“Who wants to drink alcohol?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s smart. Thank you, Alex.”

Lena suggests they do trivia next. Kara agrees. “Like Jeopardy style,” she says, flipping through errant cards from a trivia set she’d gotten years ago. “We need teams.”

Alex and Kelly curl closer together. Brainy and Nia pair up too and Winn and J’onn share a shrug before moving closer together on the couch. Lena turns to Kara. 

“I guess you’re with me.”

Kara beams.

They kill it, obviously. With Lena’s science knowledge and Kara’s extensive set of facts about 2000s pop culture nobody else really stands a chance.

“What is Camp Rock Two,” Kara says proudly, leaning forward to collect her card. Lena high fives her. 

“Who knows that?” J’onn grumbles. 

“Um, _everyone_? It’s a classic, J’onn!”

She leans back in a huff and notices Lena raising her eyebrows at her. 

“Don’t tell me you’ve never seen it, Lena!”

“I have… never seen it.”

“No! Mitchie and the boys work to save the camp? The monumental dance number on the Camp Star stage? The heartbreaking final performance?”

Lena just smiles at her as Kara slumps back on the couch. “This is awful.”

It’s Alex’s turn to select a category and she does so slowly, giving Kara enough time to readjust her stack of pillows. Suddenly Lena’s curled up, mouth to Kara’s ear.

“You can show it to me next sleepover night, okay?”

“Okay,” Kara brightens almost immediately, “yeah. And you’ll love it, I promise.”

“I’m sure I will,” Lena says. Then she tucks her head into the crook of Kara’s neck and turns back to the board where Brainy is keeping score. 

Kara finds it a little hard to concentrate and so _maybe_ she zones out a little bit. 

“Kara! You’re up,” Nia is saying suddenly, throwing a cloth coaster at her ear.

“Huh?”

“You and Lena are up,” Alex repeats, “maybe stop cuddling with your girlfriend for a second?”

Okay. So Alex is teasing. Alex actually means nothing by it, and Kara knows this because she knows the light look Alex wears when she’s teasing Kara but, like, good naturedly. Alex is just trying to get her back on track. She doesn’t mean it.

And Lena knows, and Lena laughs and says, “Fuck off, Danvers, I’ve got my boyfriend.” And Alex laughs. And it isn’t a big deal.

And, like, of course Kara knows she and Lena aren’t dating. That would be crazy. So it’s not that. It’s the fact that Lena does cuddle with someone she’s dating, and that person is James. 

The jealousy is back because of course it is, but it’s tinged with something odd. Almost like she's sad. Like a wish.

Once again she’s struck by the supposed intensity of her feelings for James. Because her heart kind of clenches when she imagines Lena and James cuddled up on the couch in the evening, she feels a deep kind of loss in her stomach. 

But there’s something wrong with it, she knows. It isn’t quite right. She is conscious now that there’s a piece missing.

But Nia’s poking her and Kelly’s sliding a card close to her end of the table and she has to get this trivia point for her and Lena, so she doesn’t have time to think. She just feels the jealousy curl up into a ball, content to stay a while. 

-

That night after she goes home she tries to harness the feeling again, to pinpoint what’s wrong, but she can’t quite reach it. She huffs, flicks off her lights, but not before adding to her list. 

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of Lena And James_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him  
#5: When it hit me that they sleep together & spend the night & I’m not there (??? It sounds weird Kara!!)  
#6: When I pictured them cuddling together _

-  
Number Seven

The seventh time is all Kara’s fault, she’s totally aware. She is the one who started the whole thing in the first place. So she can’t blame anyone other than herself.

It starts when Eliza decides to clean out the bookshelves in the house in Midvale. There are years of books and science journals and photo albums and ceramics class art that Alex had made in middle school that are finally starting to build up, she explains.

So that’s why she sends Kara a series of images of Kara as a kid. Twelve year old Kara gazing intently at the camera as though she’d never seen such a thing before (well, she hadn’t). Kara and Alex in shorts and tank tops beaming as the doors of a Barnes and Noble were unlocked for the first copies of _The Half Blood Prince_ to fly off the shelves. Kara acting as Alex’s beach umbrella, hovering feet above her head to cast a shadow over her face as Alex sunbathed. 

_Aww_ , Kara texted Eliza back, _so cute! I have 2 send 2 Alex :)_

_This is my favorite_ , Eliza replies, and attaches an image of Kara, sunglasses on upside down and a giant bucket hat with trout patterned on it tipped on her head, wearing a spaghetti strapped top with a large photo of Justin Timberlake blown up on it. I LOVE JT, the shirt proclaimed in blue bubble letters. 

Kara can’t hold back a peal of laughter. _Lena would love this_ , she thinks, and wasted no time in attaching the image to Lena’s text chain. 

_Should I submit to the CatCo Fashion’s dos and don’ts column?_ she types, and sends the message before she can think.

Lena calls her laughing.

“What the hell is that?” she says, and Kara is beaming as she starts to laugh. 

“Eliza sent it to me. I went through a phase.”

“What year is that even from?”

“Umm… summer of 2003, I think.”

“The hat really ties it all together.”

“It was all totally unironic. Alex was humiliated.”

-

That Friday when Lena sleeps over she pulls out her phone when they relax together on Kara’s couch. She’s scrolling on it rapidly before she passes it to Kara. “Here you go.”

It’s open on a photo of Lena from 2007 in a huge Paramore shirt that reaches her knees and dark smudgy eyeliner. “My mother hated that shirt,” Lena says, watching Kara scroll over her shoulder, “I think she threw it out.”

Kara’s favorite photo is of Lena at eleven, squint smiling into the camera in front of a Kelly Clarkson billboard. “That was my first concert,” Lena explains, “I made Lex take me.”

“Lex Luthor went to a _Kelly Clarkson_ concert?” Kara crows.

“Yes!” Lena laughs. (Privately, Kara notes the laugh as a win. Lena hates talking about Lex, even the happy moments are laced together with the inevitable darkness that was to come. But now Lena’s just laughing, just explaining that she’d made Lex wear merch so he’d fit in, and she’s happy. Kara’s fixated on it.)

“I love the Since U Been Gone shirt,” Kara teases, “is that a lipstick print?”

“Shut up,” Lena blushes, “I thought it was cool. How can you judge, Miss ‘I Love JT’?”

“Ha ha,” Kara rolls her eyes but she’s smiling, feeling very warm next to Lena like this. She moves to keep scrolling, checks silently with Lena, who nods once.

She moves away from 2005 and suddenly Lena is a teenager. Lena’s saved dozens of photos from boarding school to her phone. Some of them show Lena in uniform, laughing with a brunette Kara guesses is Andrea. She slows down on a photo on the beach. 

She recognizes Jack in an instant, wearing a striped tank top with a cigarette hanging from his mouth. Andrea is next to him wearing a hot pink top, white shorts, and blue eyeshadow (“It was 2009, Kara,” Lena explains, laughing). There’s another boy draped near her feet and then there’s Lena.

“How is this embarrassing?” Kara asks, peering at the photo, “You look pretty.”

“Oh, stop. The clothes, the hair… we thought we were so cool,” Lena explains, slightly pink.

Kara looks closer. “Um, I disagree. The Kelly Clarkson one I get, but this is sweet, Lena! Doesn’t even compare to my trout hat. I think I win this round.”

“Maybe,” Lena laughs softly (in Kara’s ear. That’s interesting).

“Were you two dating here?” Kara asks, gesturing between Lena and Andrea.

“I think this was more of the… physical stage.” Lena replies slowly.

“The… oh,” Kara trails off, feeling her face get hot. 

“Yeah,” Lena says, laughing lightly as she curls up closer to Kara suddenly, “oh! This one was funny. Jack’s school forced the boys to take a girl from my school to this big formal, I wore this horrible black dress because they wanted the girls to wear white… purity, you know? God, I was such a brat,” She says fondly, zooming in on Jack’s face. 

“It’s kind of a great photo,” Kara says, voice a little unfocused because she’s busy staring at the shoulder that’s almost exposed in the photo and the unmistakable outline of one of Lena’s tattoos there.

“Yeah, it is. I used to think I’d wear something like this to my wedding,” 

“What! Lena, you have to do that!”

Lena laughs loudly. “I guess it all depends on how the other person feels about it.”

_I’d_ want her to wear whatever she likes, Kara thinks with a familiar twinge of jealousy, and immediately she freezes.

What the fuck?

Where had that come from? 

She’d been jealous and James wasn’t even… not only was he not present but he hadn’t been brought up, Kara hadn’t even been _thinking_ about him! She had just been thinking about Lena getting married, and how stupid it’d be if Lena got married to someone who didn’t let her wear what she wanted, and how if _Kara_ was the one who…

Oh. 

_Oh_.

Lena is sorting through her camera roll again and tapping her fingers on her leg absentmindedly, but Kara is curled under her quiet as her world reshapes itself all at once.

She doesn’t have feelings for James. Of course she doesn’t, she hasn’t since they ended things. No, she has feelings for _Lena_. 

It all starts to make sense, all the confused moments of jealousy that Kara had written off as wanting James, all the feelings she hasn’t been able to answer for. Of course. 

She’d wanted to dance with Lena at the CatCo party. She’d wanted to text Lena and make her blush. She’d wanted Lena in her bed, small and adorable, and for it to be real. She’d wanted this to be true, wanted so deeply she couldn’t find it within herself.

And Lena’s still just… there, leaning her head back and touching Kara’s knee to ask if they can maybe get some food because she’s starving. Lena hasn’t left but Kara feels overwhelmed, feels guilty for thinking of Lena this way.

Does she know? Does she realize how Kara feels about her?

“Kara, do you want pizza, darling?”

Kara blinks, adjusts. She has feelings for Lena. She has very intense, very big feelings about Lena Luthor.

“Kara?”

“Um, yeah, that’d be great. I just have to… hold on a second…”

She’s in her room, at her desk. She sighs, bites her lip, decides she will think this all through after they eat. It’s as good of a time as any, right, she decides as she picks up her pen again.

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of James, Because He Is Dating Lena (!!!)_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him   
#5: When it hit me that they sleep together & spend the night & I’m not there (??? It sounds weird Kara!!)  
#6: When I pictured them cuddling together at home  
#7: When Lena talked about her wedding (it sounds crazy but I don’t want to think about her marrying someone else…) _

Kara needs to talk to Alex, probably. She needs to figure this out. She needs to _think_. 

But in that moment Lena leans into Kara’s room tentatively to ask if she wants to watch some TV before the pizza comes and Kara feels her stomach flutter (really, how could she _not_ have known?). Her heart reaches out for Lena and so she follows, lets herself be tucked under her slew of emotions once again.

-  
Number Eight

So Kara is probably in love with Lena. 

She sits with the casual thought of just “feelings” for almost two weeks before it hits her all at once, which is both wildly new and intensely familiar. It’s like an array of moments, a montage— the jealousy, sure, but other things too. The pride she feels whenever Lena holds an especially successful CatCo meeting. The thrill she gets whenever she gets a text from Lena. The way her heart beats slower in lazy nights where it’s just the two of them, the way she thinks that Lena probably understands her little quirks and feelings better than she does, sometimes, on par with only Alex. It’s the way she finds herself feeling about Lena in the moments where she isn’t thinking about it. The unconscious… well, love.

Somehow her jealousy has only become more painful since realizing it’s Lena she’s pining for and not James after all. James was easy to brush off as a crush, someone she’d gotten over before and someone she could get over again. A quick blip. 

Lena is different. Kara’s pretty sure there is no getting over Lena Luthor, which is both terrifying and so, so lovely to consider. But either way it’s changed now, she thinks about Lena and James cuddling or texting and she doesn’t just feel a flutter of jealousy but a storm, doesn’t just feel uncomfortable but feels a sadness, a wish. 

However… Lena just doesn’t understand, Kara realizes one day after their CatCo lunch, how good she is. Lena is a CEO. Lena is busy every single day. Lena actually saves the world every so often. Lena has Lillian and Lex to worry about. Lena has friends and a boyfriend. And yet Lena still carves out special time for Kara, because she knows that sometimes Kara needs it to just be the two of them. Lena always checks in with her, never lets her feel abandoned, never lets her feel left behind. And that, to Kara, is love. Even if it is platonic love on Lena’s end.

Because Kara isn’t stupid. Why would Lena Luthor, who has been on every ‘Most Attractive’ list for as long as she’s been in the public eye, ever look twice at her? Why would an _actual_ genius have real feelings for a reporter? She was still wrapping her head around their _friendship_ , after all. 

But Kara’s realized Lena doesn’t understand how much her careful affection and understanding means at the end of the day. Even as Kara feels mild guilt for not telling Lena how she feels (Lena is dating James, obviously, and Kara would not even dream of doing anything to mess it up) Lena just continues to be good, and kind, and perfect. 

One night on the phone with Lena Kara offhandedly mentions that she was looking for a new book to read and the next morning there was a stack of three on her desk. Lena sends her funny videos, texts her in the mornings before work to make sure any Supergirl duties work out, lets Kara write plans in her calendar, which is packed full with board meetings and business deals, with a smile. 

Kara’s at the DEO early one morning, about half an hour before she’s due at CatCo, splitting a plate of croissants with Winn.

“The trick of the chocolate ones is to fold them over so you get chocolate in every bite,” Kara demonstrates, and Winn looks on intently with a mouthful of almond croissant. 

“Isn’t it just easier to take bites from the ends? So then you meet in the middle?”

“Trust me, Winn. I’m the expert on these things,” she says wisely, raising her eyebrows as she tosses a piece into the air to catch with her mouth. 

“Nice.”

“Thank you!”

“Supergirl!” J’onn interrupts, walking toward them quickly. Winn swallows his food abruptly, “We have a bank robbery downtown, not too serious but it’d be nice to get it out of the way. Are you good to take it?”

“Yep!” Kara says, bouncing out of her chair, “See you in a few!”

She loves flying in the mornings. The air is always so much fresher up high and the city gets a blue gray tint. If she listens she hears the bustle of thousands of kids leaving for school, the sounds of the buses carting people across the city, the names being called out from baristas far below. It’s relaxing. She loves her city, always has, and loves to see it in this light when things are calm. 

Well, most things. 

The robbers are running toward a big van when she touches down. The alarm wails and passerby push themselves up against storefronts to stay out of the way. There’s a TV crew there, Kara notes with some faint annoyance (they get distracting once she finishes, the anchors always ask too many questions of her), but she can narrow her focus down to the three guys jumping into the car doors. 

“You didn’t think it’d be that easy, did you?” she says, putting on a smirk when one of the men notices her, face falling. She _loves_ when she gets to say it like that. 

“Go, go!” One of the robbers shouts and she steps in front of the van almost lazily, blocking their path in an instant. One of the men jumps out, tries to push her away, so she wields him off lazily, depositing him in handcuffs in a burst of superspeed. Why do they always assume they can take her in a fight? She’s always wondered. 

It’s over in a few minutes and she graces the camera with a quick smile and wave (it’s more for the kids watching than the news station itself) before taking off again. She’s still got twenty minutes before work so she stops back at the DEO.

“Nice one,” Winn says, high fiving her.

She stops by the locker room to get her phone and her bag. Alex is at her own locker, taking off heavy duty boots. She waves at Kara. 

“Good save, I just saw you on TV. Are you off to work?”

“Yep!” Kara says, turning the dial on her lock, “Hey, wanna do a sister night tomorrow? I want to watch Schitt’s Creek.”

“For sure,” Alex says, “how’s nine work for you?”

“Perfect,” Kara says. Or she’s pretty sure she does. She’s a little distracted because she’s turned on her phone and there’s a text from Lena waiting on the screen that reads _James & I just saw the bank robbery on TV. Great job, great wave to the camera (very chic). XOXO_. 

And, well. She barely even recognizes the jealousy of knowing that James is in Lena’s office before work under the butterflies that are celebrating wildly in her stomach. Lena is just… so _sweet_ , so caring. And she loves her. She really, really loves her. 

“Kara?” Alex says slowly, poking her in the shoulder, “Why are you smiling like that?”

“Like what? I’m not!” she says instantly, putting her phone back in her locker quickly. Alex raises an eyebrow. 

“Um, what is up with you?”

“Nothing! Everything is normal.”

“Kara, you can’t lie to me. You’re smiling and blushing and you’ve been doing it a lot lately. Like, a _lot_ ,” Alex says, taking a step closer to Kara.

“No, I haven’t…” she trails off awkwardly.

“Kara, do you have a crush on someone?”

“No.”

“You do!”

“I don’t!”

“Who is it?”

“I won’t tell you, Alex! Stop doing that.”

“So you do like someone!”

“Leave me alone,” Kara whines, sticking her head into her locker.

“Is it that dude from your work who’s in love with you?”

“No one is in love with me, Alex.”

“Yeah, the guy who always gives you part of his lunch absolutely is. Oh, is it James?”

“No!”

“I won’t stop until you tell me, Kara. I’m your sister!”

“Fine!” Kara says, and Alex instantly goes quiet, eyes wide. “Um, it’s not… well, I wouldn’t say it’s a crush, it’s more like… well…”

Alex nods expectantly.

“I guess I’m kinda… maybe a little bit… in love? With, um… with Lena.”

“Oh my god,” Alex says quietly, “oh my god, Nia was right.”

“Nia? What does she have to do with this?”

“She knew,” Alex says, nodding slowly, “I wasn’t sure but she knew, she told me months ago. Oh my god.”

“Um, what? How did she know? I didn’t even know until two weeks ago!”

“I don’t know! You can ask her yourself! But… Kara. Are you, um… are you doing okay?”

“Yeah,” Kara says, smiling slowly. “You know what? I am. Like, I know she’s with James and I get jealous and it isn’t gonna happen but like… just knowing that I love her makes me happy. And now every time we’re together it feels bigger, somehow. I don’t know. It makes me happy.”

Alex smiles at her, because beyond all the silly bickering Alex is her best friend and her sister and she knows things. “That’s really good, Kara.”

“It is,” she says softly, “yeah, it is. I really love her, Alex.”

“You know, I can totally see it now. A lot is starting to make sense. I mean, the amount that you cuddle is truly ridiculous.”

“That’s just rude. And Lena usually initiates that, Alex, and she has a boyfriend. So quit it.”

“Still,” Alex huffs, but she leans forward to envelop Kara in a hug, “Kara, you know that if you ever want to talk about it you can come to me, right?”

“Yeah, totally,” Kara says, “it feels good to tell you, actually. Really good.”

Her phone’s alarm chimes just then, signalling that she needs to be over at CatCo as soon as possible. So she kisses Alex on the head, darts out the big window, and is outside the lobby in a second. 

When she gets to her desk she makes quick eye contact with Lena in the big fishbowl office. Lena smiles widely at her before looking back at her laptop and it makes Kara feel warm inside suddenly.

She feels almost half hearted in adding to her list but technically she had felt jealous for a moment, even if it was undercut by the joy of having a private text from Lena. So she takes the notebook out of her bag and adds another line.

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of James, Because He Is Dating Lena (!!!)_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him   
#5: When it hit me that they sleep together & spend the night & I’m not there (??? It sounds weird Kara!!)  
#6: When I pictured them cuddling together at home  
#7: When Lena talked about her wedding (it sounds crazy but I don’t want to think about her marrying someone else…)  
#8: Lena and James hang out in her office before work and I wish I could be there with her instead _

-  
Number Nine

Life goes on and Kara feels, to some extent, like a weight has been lifted off her chest now that Alex knows. She’ll shoot her little understanding looks whenever Kara looks put out while Lena and James are being affectionate. She validates Kara, listens to her stories, and it’s helpful. It is. 

And Lena remains her caring lovely self. She saves a pint of ice cream when Kara has to come late to a Game Night because of an article deadline. She leans in to listen intently when Kara asks a question about business during one of Lena’s board meeting stories, gives her an answer that doesn’t make her feel silly for asking. Kara interviews Lena and Lena smiles wide every time Kara understands a science concept (she is a Kryptonian, after all. Just because Earth business customs don’t make sense doesn’t mean chemistry doesn’t).

If Kara was in love before she is even more now. It feels so different to see Lena act so soft around her when she _knows_ how she feels about her, it sends a new thrill up her spine. And Lena is so frequently good to her, but she’s also just amazing always. Kara loves to watch her with their other friends, or talking to other reporters at work, because she’s always so focused and so intent. Lena really cares, cares about everything she does so wholly and it’s inspiring.

Her favorite part is when Lena will lock eyes with her in the midst of another conversation and send her a smile, or pull a face if she’s talking to someone particularly boring or unbearable. It’s special, it’s just for Kara. And when it happens she’s tempted to just burst forward and kiss Lena in front of everyone, or take her flying, or spin her around if she could. Instead, she keeps a little tally on a post-it stuck on her desk at CatCo (it’s currently at seven since she started it a week ago).

So things inevitably go wrong on Sunday. Kara’s savoring the last of the weekend with a bowl of ice cream and her easel, painting a blur of greens together just to categorize them. Greens are deep and lovely, she’s found. 

There’s a knock on her door and it’s kind of tentative, which is weird because she doesn’t have company and because she has super hearing, obviously, so she’d know someone knocked even if it _was_ quiet. A quick scan of the door tells her it’s Lena and she’s by the door in a heartbeat.

When it’s open, though, her heart plummets. Because Lena is crying. Lena is standing at her door in a pretty navy blue coat and with her hands all knotted together in that nervous way she does and her cheeks are pink and there are tears smudged on them. Lena is _crying_.

“Oh Rao, Lena, are you okay? What’s wrong?” Kara asks, ushering Lena inside her apartment by her elbow. 

“James and I broke up,” Lena says softly, “I’m sorry if I disturbed you but I just… I wanted someone to talk to, if that’s okay?”

“Of course,” Kara breathes out in a sigh, “of course, Lena. Are you… are you okay, really?”

“Yeah, I am,” Lena says, shrugging off her coat at Kara’s expectant gaze. “Um, it was mutual. Which isn’t a line, it actually was. I mean, he brought it up and then I thought about it and he was right, so I just… I mean, I don’t know why I’m upset, really, but…”

“Lena, you just broke up with somebody. You’re allowed to be upset, okay?” Kara says, staring Lena down until she nods. “Do you want anything? Can I make you some tea?”

“Yeah,” Lena says, and it seems like she exhales all her air then, sitting on one of Kara’s barstools, tracking her with her green eyes. 

“Okay. I’ll put a teapot on.”

She does, and waits until it whistles before pouring it into Lena’s favorite mug with a teabag from Lena’s section of her pantry— it actually is necessary that Lena has her own area because Kara would hate to happen upon lentil crackers when she's looking for an actual snack.

“Thank you,” Lena says as she takes the mug and Kara sits gingerly across from her.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I will,” Lena says after a moment, “but could we just… not, for a second?”

“Absolutely.”

They sit in silence for a while, considering. Lena stirs her tea and it makes little clinking sounds on the edges of the mug. Kara watches her, sees the tears dry up and the way Lena seems to relax into the comfort of Kara’s space. 

Lena’s eyes dart over to Kara’s green canvas after a bit longer and she smiles over at her. “Were you working on that when I got here?”

“Yeah,” Kara says, “I mean, it’s not really supposed to be anything, I was just experimenting with color, so.”

“I think it’s beautiful,” Lena says, and Kara feels her face burn red.

They segue back into silence from there. Lena finishes her tea and puts her mug in the sink and they quietly migrate over to the couch. Lena grabs a blanket and curls up underneath it, staring at the black of the night outside the window.

“He said I didn’t love him anymore,” Lena says suddenly, and Kara stops fidgeting with the edge of her couch to listen intently. 

“And I was going to argue. Because, like, he’s my boyfriend, of course I love him! But then I thought about it. It was starting to feel like we were just friends again, there was no spark, or anything. And he said maybe I didn’t have feelings because I have feelings for someone else, which—,” here Lena trails off and looks at Kara and it’s _intense_. Like, very intense. Like Kara doesn’t dare to breathe for a second, and Lena’s eyes are raking over her face. And then it’s over in a second like it never happened. 

“Which, obviously, um. That is not true, of course, so, well,” Lena finishes quickly, and is it just the lighting, or does she look a little pink? But that’s not important, Kara remembers, Lena’s talking.

“Well, and then he asked if that was true, and I said maybe it was, and I said I thought it was, and he agreed. So then he asked if we should break up and I said yes. So I don’t know why I was crying, I haven’t loved him for a while. It’s just, like, when a relationship fails, or something, I just… I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Kara says, taking Lena’s hand as new tears start to fall. “You’re allowed to cry. You’re allowed to be upset. You can feel whatever you want, I’m here for you. Okay?”

“You don’t have to, Kara, I’m fine, I—,”

“I’m here for you, okay?” Kara repeats more firmly. Lena gives a little shudder into Kara’s neck.

“Alright,” she says, and it’s muffled against Kara’s skin so Kara just sits there and holds her. 

-

Lena spends the night at Kara’s insistence. Lena had protested that she was completely okay, after four hours of cuddles and occasional tears and more frequent laughs. Kara had protested right back that this was for her own health. “I get cold,” she’d explained, “and I know I’ll be lonely tonight if you’re not here.”

Kara knows that Lena knows it’s absolute bullshit but she stays anyway, so it doesn’t matter!

Once again Kara’s struck by the sight of Lena in her bed with her old NCU hoodie and a blue scrunchie she’d found strewn on Kara’s desk. 

“Um, do you need an alarm for the morning?” Kara says in lieu of kissing Lena when she looks up at her.

Lena hesitates. “I don’t want it to wake you up too early,” she says, fidgeting with the side of the comforter. Right, Kara remembers, Lena’s only ever stayed over into a Saturday morning, never a Monday. 

“Oh, it won’t!” Kara says, “I like to go flying on weekday mornings. I could wake you up, if you’d rather?”

“Oh,” Lena says, “that would be nice.”

Nice. It’d be _nice_.

“Okay, sure!” Kara says sort of loudly, mostly to distract herself from the pressing thought that Lena might actually enjoy seeing Kara first thing in the morning. Because that is ridiculous. 

“Come here,” Lena says after a moment, moving the blankets so that Kara can curl up in them. It’s warm and safe and her bed smells like Lena. Rao. 

Lena switches off the light and lets out a little noise through her nose as she butts her head into Kara’s chest and neck. 

“Goodnight, Lena.” Kara says, tucking her chin over Lena’s head protectively.

“Goodnight,” Lena says, and then in a much softer voice a moment later, “thank you.”

Kara just smiles. “Always.”

-

Kara wakes with the sun as usual. It’s always a good morning when Lena is in her bed and today the same is true. Lena’s hair is coming out of its bun and is tickling Kara’s lips, and she looks so beautiful in the early light that Kara never wants to get up.

It’s a quick decision. She does do a quick loop every weekday morning regardless of whether or not she’s going to the DEO, but a quick scan of any abnormal noises raises no concerns and she’s so, so comfortable. Plus, she can hear Lena’s heartbeat comforting right next to Kara’s ribs and she has the sudden desperate thought that she has everything she’s ever needed in bed with her.

She doesn’t fall asleep, not quite. She lingers. There’s a while before Lena asked to be woken up so Kara lays still, watches the faint sunlight trace Lena’s eyelashes.

Lena and James are broken up and she is not going to do anything about it, she remembers. 

First of all, it’s probably never going to happen between her and Lena. And while it’s not ideal, because being with Lena would be a dream come true, it’s alright. She’ll be content to admire Lena from whatever vicinity Lena allows her to. Just knowing her is really and truly enough.

Second of all, rebounds are bad. If Lena had, for example, responded to Kara’s feelings… physically? Kara can’t even think it without blushing. Well, if she had, hypothetically, it would be a problem. Because Lena wouldn’t have real feelings and Kara would, and Kara would be a rebound and it wouldn’t be fair. It would be bad best friend behavior and absolutely not what Lena deserves.

So she is not going to say anything. Not yet, at least. Not for a little while. Because she thinks she is going to tell Lena at some point, just so she knows. She deserves to _know_.

But even if Lena hadn’t just been through a breakup she wasn’t sure she could ruin things this morning, because it’s just so perfect. It feels like a lake in the early dawn, before there’s a single ripple, and she couldn’t imagine changing it for anything.

With that, she settles into the bed to drift in and out of sleep with one eye on the clock. Finally it’s almost time for Lena to be awake and so Kara savors her last few moments of rest, her last look at the gold that touches Lena’s forehead. 

“Lena,” she whispers, so soft. Lena lets out a little noise. Kara holds her arms, gives her the lightest of squeezes. 

“Lena? It’s time to wake up,” she says, and her heart and stomach clench when Lena’s brow furrows and her eyes blink open carefully. 

Then Lena seems to register that it’s Kara above her and she _smiles_. It’s so soft, so careful, and Kara can hardly stand it. 

“Hi, Kara,” she whispers, and sits up in bed. She’s kind of still interlaced with Kara, though, so when she does she meets Kara’s shoulder with her chin and curls up there instead. Kara doesn’t dare to breathe in case it makes Lena move.

But then they have to because it’s morning and that is how mornings go. It feels very _right_ that Lena’s in the bathroom while Kara scrambles eggs, feels right that Lena gives her a little hand squeeze when she sets a plate with eggs and bacon and cantaloupe in front of her. They leave for CatCo together and take the bus because Lena had given her driver the week off after he’d picked her up crying last night. 

They settle into adjacent seats and Kara pushes down thoughts of how natural it feels. Lena leans into her just a little. 

“So, how was your morning flight?” her eyes have that Lena look, the look that’s a little bit teasing but mostly just affectionate. It’s one that is typically for Kara.

“Oh, I didn’t go on it today,” Kara says.

“Why not?”

“I was just comfortable where I was, I guess,” she says, which feels a little too daring except that Lena just smiles bright and soft at her and it’s okay.

Well, it’s okay until some stupid man thinks it’s his place to talk to Lena. He shouldn’t even have the audacity to look at her, Kara thinks, because he’s _rude_.

“You’re that Luthor, aren’t you? I hope you end up just like your brother,” he says, voice dripping with disdain. 

Lena had once told her she didn’t like to discourage people from airing their grievances with her or L-Corp if they were valid. But that applied to complaints about, like, inventions. Not personal stuff. Not stuff like this.

And she looks at Lena and Lena doesn’t look angry or offended, just a little sad. Kara knows, horrifyingly, that this is not an uncommon occurrence, but Lena looks disappointed now. Kara knows the feeling. The morning had been so perfect. 

But if Lena is sad then it’s her place to step in. The man is shooting daggers at Lena and as he turns to return to his seat across the aisle Kara stands up and grabs his coat sleeve in an instant. Lena looks up at her in surprise.

“Excuse me,” Kara says, “but that was very rude. Do you think you’d like to apologize?”

“For what?” The man says, rolling his eyes, “Lex Luthor’s a fucking criminal. So’s his mother.”

“Yeah, and this is _Lena_ , not Lex. If you paid attention for more than a second you’d know she’s changed the family name to represent good things. She uses L-Corp to help. She donates obscene amounts to charities, and it’s not for the recognition because she really cares and she’ll make anonymous donations when she cares the most. Lena’s denounced her family at every turn. Apologize. To. Her.” She punctuates the last three words with sharp squeezes of the man’s wrist.

“Ow!”

“Sorry,” she says, but it’s monotonous. She isn’t sorry. She’ll break his hand off if she needs to.

“Kara,” Lena says then, hand on Kara’s hip, “it’s okay.”

“No,” Kara says, “no, he’s wrong and he’s going to apologize. Did you know Lena dropped off the billionaire list a few months ago because she donated so much money? Did you know it was Lena who spent weeks in the lab making image inducers to lessen hate crimes against aliens?”

“I… didn’t,” the man says, having the decency to look somewhat ashamed. 

“Say you’re sorry,” Kara says again.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and it’s not perfect but it’s enough. She drops his wrist.

“Have a good day, sir!” Kara says brightly, pretending she doesn’t hear him cursing as he rubs his wrist on the way back to his row. She drops into her seat again. 

Lena doesn’t say anything but she does smile softly and so Kara knows she appreciates it. Which is enough. 

They reach CatCo on time and part ways at Lena’s office door with a last squeeze of hands. Kara feels on top of the world. Nothing can touch her today, she’s sure of it. 

She does add to her list, though not quite for jealousy reasons this time. 

_Times I’ve Felt Jealous Of James, Because He Is Dating Lena (!!!)_

_#1: CatCo holiday party  
#2: Game nights where they’re too close on the couch  
#3: When James texted Lena in her office and she was blushing  
#4: When Lena ordered James’s dish for him   
#5: When it hit me that they sleep together & spend the night & I’m not there (??? It sounds weird Kara!!)  
#6: When I pictured them cuddling together at home  
#7: When Lena talked about her wedding (it sounds crazy but I don’t want to think about her marrying someone else…)  
#8: Lena and James hang out in her office before work and I wish I could be there with her instead   
#9: I want to be the one to defend her if she ever needs it. I want to always protect her. (I love her so much.)_

-  
The End Of The Start

A month has passed since one of the best mornings of Kara’s life (even with the man on the bus, who still features in some of her punching bag fantasies in DEO training). She doesn’t want to sound cheesy but things have only gotten better with Lena. And when things are good with Lena it’s like the sun shines brighter. She’s been kicking ass as Supergirl lately, even the media’s noticed. She’s published more articles than she usually does in a month. Lena’s renovations are finally finished and she’s let Kara make her a Pinterest board for her bathroom, the next step.

The other thing is that they’ve gotten closer, somehow. More comfortable. They text and call in the night sometimes, and if Lena wants Kara she just says so.

Which is kind of what happens here. It’s late, a little past midnight, and Kara’s phone is glowing with a message. _Hi, ru awake? I was thinking about u <3_

_I’m up!_ Kara responds, _Do u want me to come over?_

_Yes please_ Lena replies in an instant and Kara bounces out of bed in excitement. She’s going to see Lena!

Alex has teased her more and more lately about how much time they spend together, how they tend to meet up three separate times in a day (plus work, but Kara is sure that doesn’t count because they don’t get to talk then, usually). “Kara,” she’d say, “the rebound stage is long gone. You two are getting more and more insufferable. Could you please try to do something about it?”

But they’re happy and Kara doesn’t want to make waves. Things are so perfect right now. 

And now she’s on the way to Lena’s place. She can hear her heartbeat get louder as she comes closer and it’s kind of thrilling. She taps on the bedroom window and sees Lena’s face light up from her bed, bathed in lamplight.

Lena has an armchair in her bedroom (it’s a big room, Lena’s very rich) and that’s where Kara flies out of habit. Lena is sitting up in bed. It feels natural again, feels like it’s right. Everything feels right with Lena, she supposes.

“Hi, Kara.”

“Hey! I’m so glad you texted because I honestly could not sleep, I’m meeting Kelly and Alex for some pottery painting thing tomorrow— oh, they said you can come, by the way— and I don’t know why something so chill would make me so wired but I totally am! It’s weird!”

“That sounds thrilling,” Lena says, voice raspier with the night, “Um, could we maybe go to my couch?”

They do, settling into familiar spots. Kara traces Lena’s living room with her eyes.

“You know, it looks so much more like you after the renovations. Full of life and personality. It’s gorgeous,” she says, turning to catch Lena’s eye to find that Lena is staring at her intently. Really intently. 

“I want to talk to you about something,” Lena says, and Kara nods quickly.

“Anything, Lena.”

“I wanted to tell you part of the story about why James and I broke up. The part I didn’t tell you before.” 

“Oh.”

“Yeah. I told you that we both realized we weren’t in love anymore, that’s true. And then I told you that he said maybe I wasn’t in love with him because I had feelings for someone else, and that I said—,”

“Right, you said that you didn’t have feelings for anyone,” Kara says, nodding as the conversation comes back to her. 

“Well, that was a lie.” Lena says it abruptly and it hits Kara then that Lena is _nervous_. She’s fidgeting and speaking in a strangely stilted way and she’s nervous, for some reason. 

“Oh,” she says then, for lack of a better thought, “okay. Um, so you do have feelings for someone?”

“I do. I’m… I’m in love with someone?” Lena says, and there are the nerves, shining through clearly in the uptick at the end of her voice. Kara, out of instinct, reaches out to touch Lena’s forearm comfortingly.

“Lena, you can tell me who it is, whoever it is,” Kara says, trying desperately to suppress the riot that is getting ready take place in her chest at the thought of Lena with someone else _again_. She’d promised to be there for Lena always, though, so she is.

“Yeah,” Lena says through a little huff of a laugh, “well, um. It’s you.”

Kara’s world tilts. 

“M-um, me?”

“Yes, Kara. You.”

“Oh.”

Lena looks very stressed suddenly, for some reason. “I just wanted to be honest with you, I don’t need you to reciprocate, I just… well, I didn’t know when I was with James but then when he mentioned it everything kind of started to click into place and then it all made sense and ever since then I’ve realized it’s you, Kara, you make everything so easy for me. I feel so safe with you, and everything is so right when we’re together, it’s just… but if you don’t feel the same I don’t want you to be uncomfortable, so I’ll—,”

“Lena?”

“Yes?”

“I love you. So, so much.”

“You, you’re… really?”

“Of course,” Kara says, shaking her head a bit, “of course I do, how could I not? It’s like you said. Everything’s right when we’re together.”

She’s been fidgeting, looking down at her fingers, but the moment she looks up to meet Lena’s eyes is transformative because Lena’s looking at her in _awe_.

Kara just smiles. “Lena, would it maybe be alright if I kissed you?”

“Yes,” Lena breathes out, already leaning in more than she had already been, “yes, please.”

And then they finally bridge the gap and Kara finds that Lena’s lips touching hers is one feeling she’d never give up. Not for the world. She is a superhero and she could move mountains and she’d do it for Lena in a heartbeat, no questions asked. It should scare her, she thinks as Lena moves her head and deepens the kiss the slightest bit. It should terrify her but it doesn’t because it feels so right. It always had. 

They pull away in a gasp and Lena’s flushed pink and she looks gorgeous and _happy_ and Kara feels like she has enough energy to lift the world in that moment. They lock eyes. 

Then they both break into wide smiles within the same heartbeat.

**Author's Note:**

> here is my [twitter](https://twitter.com/queenofmarigxld) and my [tumblr](https://blackseablacksky.tumblr.com/) so follow if you feel like it! thanks so much for reading


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